250 comments

[quote="Maedi"]
The images in this thread that aren't showing are those hosted on danlepard.com. I am assuming that Dan's site doesn't allow 'hotlinking' which means images on his site can't be viewed [i]through[/i] other sites.
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[quote="carla"]
I cannot even load the pages there without letting firefox allow all sorts of things, so I won't post there. If a website has so many features that I cannot go there then I just stay away. Sad but true.
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I cannot even load the pages there without letting firefox allow all sorts of things, so I won't post there. If a website has so many features that I cannot go there then I just stay away. Sad but true.

[quote="SourDom"]
PS Maedi is there a reason I can't see Celia's photo? - is it related to the new forum software (I have encountered it in other posts) - her photo looks like it is inserted in the post in the usual way.
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SourDom and Ceila, I'd love to help. The code for your images is correct. The images in this thread that aren't showing are those hosted on danlepard.com. I am assuming that Dan's site doesn't allow 'hotlinking' which means images on his site can't be viewed [i]through[/i] other sites. You will have to host your images on another site such as [url=http://flickr.com]flick[color=#FF0080]r[/color][/url], [url=http://photobucket.com][color=#000000]photo[/color][color=#000080]b[/color][color=#000000]ucket[/color][/url] or our awesome [url=http://sourdough.com.au/gallery/][b][color=#333333]Sourdough.com.au Gallery[/color][/b][/url] (in personal albums).

[quote="celia"]
I entered photos of my amateur baguettes in Dan's contest, hope it's ok for a newbie to offer a contribution here as well. I'm chuffed with the big holes in the bread, and can't help showing off...

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you have good cause to show off Celia!
those baguettes look great, very nice looking crust and open crumb

well done, and welcome

cheers
Dom

PS Maedi is there a reason I can't see Celia's photo? - is it related to the new forum software (I have encountered it in other posts) - her photo looks like it is inserted in the post in the usual way.

I entered photos of my amateur baguettes in Dan's contest, hope it's ok for a newbie to offer a contribution here as well. I'm chuffed with the big holes in the bread, and can't help showing off... :D

I used Teresa's Northwest Sourdough starter at 166% hydration, strong bread flour, extra virgin olive oil, water and salt. I adopt Dan's advice and knead it every 10 mins for the first half hour, then fold 3 ways at the half hour and one hour mark. Makes a very chewy ciabatta-like baguette.

Been a while since I have checked out this thread! You guys are doing serious bread porn! I only wish we could share the taste somehow!
Great job Dom and Jeremy. I have been experimenting with San Francisco style, Desem and just a variety of sourdough lately. I usually keep my starters at 166% and find I like that best, for keeping quality and making up my recipes. Although it is nice to try different hydrations and outcomes. Teresa

the dough is mixed by hand day 1, and then put in the fridge
The next day fold at hourly intervals for 4-6 hours until light and very bubbly (timing depends on how warm the house is). Then divide and shape, and prove for 2-4 hours.

The dough is very sticky, and pretty hard to shape and slash - the baguettes below aren't as beautiful as some that I have made, but the flavour and crumb are worth it.

I just sift regular wholemeal flour as described in the recipe, we don't have the range of flours here in NZ that our Amercan and European friends seem to - though it sounds like we're better off than TP!

It is interesting that your starter likes the more liquid refreshment. I have been mostly using a French-style levain at ~60% hydration in the last couple of weeks. I think that it works better for my sourdough, but the taste difference is too subtle for me to be sure.

Yesterday I baked the French country sourdough from Maggie Glezer (following in your footsteps from a week or two ago. Did you use regular wholemeal flour, or did you find some 85% extraction flour?). It was baked in a casserole, with enormous oven spring and superior crust, albeit slight dodgy slashing. I also made some of the best ciabatta that I have made so far (using the a l'ancienne formula - not sourdough unfortunately). Panettone is baking as I write.

Made 3 breads yesterday, one of them a anis currant mountain loaf(Bouley bakery) was demolished at a local bistro where the chef, the owners wife and a customer knocked it out with cheese and wine till 12 midnight! No pics sorry!
A miche is also on the way later today, I am finding that keeping my levain at 125% and feeding it regularily has made my bread moister, more flavor and definition as well, so here is the levain baguett paysanne I made and we just got pics while having breakfast, with some under 40 cheese from Oz and some great goat cheese!
[img]http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y85/jergra/CIMG1671.jpg[/img]
[img]http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y85/jergra/CIMG1668.jpg[/img]
[img]http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y85/jergra/CIMG1669.jpg[/img]

Hey Dom,
Where do you find the time? I am so beat from work and well I think I love baguettes, but I am going to rye again, gonna do a TP bread with some weird hybrid flour triticale (wheat/rye) Gonna return to the baguette though, the battle isn't over yet!

Reinhart's baguettes were impressive. I was a bit cynical, thinking that they couldn't be all that different, but for a non-sourdough all-white baguette they do have an astounding depth of flavour.

I am still working on my sourdough baguettes. This was the crumb of the latest version. The same formula as above, only I forgot to add the lower-protein flour, and retarded for about 36 hours after shaping (surplus of bread in the house).

[img]http://www.sourdough.com.au/gallery/d/5483-2/DSCN1669.JPG[/img]

The thin cell walls are the best that I have achieved yet. Moderately open texture, though not as wild as the Reinhart version.
I don't have a picture of the whole baguettes. They were pretty dark in colour, probably as a result of all that retarding.

Reinhart's recipe makes me wonder whether it makes a difference when you retard the dough. He makes a big deal about putting the dough in the fridge immediately after mixing/kneading with ice-cold water. The idea is to allow sugars to be released from the starch before yeast activity starts.I know that Jack Lang started his sourdough baguettes with a version that was derived from the Reinhart formula. I am tempted to have a go at retarding after mixing (similar to the a l'ancienne baguettes), and see how that affects flavour.

I am still playing around a little.
I have a batch of Peter Reinhart's Pain a L'ancienne in the fridge to make into baguettes tomorrow. He makes such a fuss about this recipe as being the be all and end-all. I'll be interested to see how it compares to the sourdough retarded baguettes.

No splitting today. I suspect that serious steam helps, but I haven't done the controlled experiment.

This is the latest version. It uses a starter that is firmer than usual (following Jack's suggestion), as well as a combination of my regular baking flour (11.8g protein) and some supermarket plain flour (10.8g protein).

For this attempt, the dough was mixed (three short kneads over 30 mins) then put in the fridge for 12 hours. It had about 5 hours out of the fridge, then was divided and shaped before going back in the fridge.
Out of the fridge this morning and straight into a hot oven (220C) with a lot of steam (dish full of boiling water plus spraying).

Mick, you have to try harder to 'listen' when Jeremy speaks. He has been sounding that he's going to Vermont this weekend to unravel the secrets of Hamelman's breads. And, so, we'll be getting some peace and quiet for 3...no, counting down...2 plus more days.
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TP?
Yes I am back, with video, bread, formulas and well more knowledge!As far as phew is that a smell or additude?
As for the baguette, Mr. Hamelman said it's silly to really expect a perfect baguette without yeast, yes yeast! Purists we are but we sometimes need a bit of that stuff!

Jeremy
P.S. Just unpacking, maybe will give you all an extra 3 day break?

[quote="bethesdabakers"]
(What IS occurring in Oz next year Jeremy? No good just hinting. Will my bus pass get me there?)

Mick
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Well...I am NOT Jeremy (phew!!!), but I'll link you to [url=http://www.sourdough.com.au/forum/viewtopic.php?t=488&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0]where bread angels fear to tread[/url].

Mick, you have to try harder to 'listen' when Jeremy speaks. He has been sounding that he's going to Vermont this weekend to unravel the secrets of Hamelman's breads. And, so, we'll be getting some peace and quiet for 3...no, counting down...2 plus more days.

The taste and texture of baguettes in France varies hugely from bakery to bakery, restaurant to restaurant.
I hope I am not repeating the obvious (I've not been following this thread until recently) but the baguette bit is the shape. If one shaped it accordingly you could make a baguette out of 'Mother's Pride' dough. Mind you, I bet some of the additives would be illegal in France.
I still get pleasure from the startlingly light baguettes that are served in some of the less grand restaurants. These are a long way from the deeply flavoured and highly crisp crust of a lot of the baguettes I would buy for preference.
If a baguette was to be naturally leavened it would normally be sold as such to inform the customer - 'Baguette au Levain', but would not, I believe, have to be. Don't forget that French food and wine laws can be very strict.
I have spent a fair amount of time in South East France towards the Alps (think of the area from just east of Lyon to Geneva and you are in a hugely varied culinary paradise) and you see a lot of sourdough around there but it is usually boule.
Just a few thoughts to share with you. I don't often shape baguettes, but I will have a bash and post a photo.
Best wishes
Pab

Well, I blame that Jeremy. When he started this contest he didn't define what a baguette is. A French baguette couldn't be any more different from something like the recipe I posted last year [url]http://www.sourdough.com.au/forum//viewtopic.php?p=173#173[/url]. So where was the level playing field?

That's the trouble with these impetuous Americans.

(What IS occurring in Oz next year Jeremy? No good just hinting. Will my bus pass get me there?)

[quote]
In the euphoria of the ?20s the French were to see the triumph of a delicious form of bread which was to ensure a worldwide reputation for French baking. This type of bread was the product of a new, so called ?direct? method of fermentation, which consisted of incorporating the yeast straight into the dough just before kneading. Less sour than leaven bread, easier to prepare than a dough with poolish, what was initially termed pain de fantasie (fancy bread) was first made by city bakers. It rapidly seduced customers with its thin, crunchy crust, its light and spongy cream coloured crumb and its pleasant, wheaty taste. Bakers made them into long loaves of various sizes, which gradually came to be known by the names we still use today: baguette (stick), the shorter batard and thinner ficelle (string).
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You might be right in principal but not totally right when it comes to the baguette. To quote Raymond Calvel,

[quote]
The baguette has become a rather hackneyed symbol of French life but it does not have a long history. Following the first world war the technology was at last in place to produce light and delicately flavoured loaves with a crispy crust. Mixing machines, stronger flours, yeast-based recipes, steam injection ovens ect. all contributed to this.
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The vast majority of French baguettes are yeasted and always have been. In response to the "return of good bread" movement some French bakers are now producing speciality baguettes using better flours and containing some levain which they call, ironically, [i]baguettes de tradition[/i] - and, of course, they charge more for them.

[quote="bethesdabakers"]
Dear Carla, You might be right in principal but not totally right when it comes to the baguette.
The vast majority of French baguettes are yeasted [b]and always have been.[/b]
[/quote]

Hi Mick,
that would mean that 100 years ago there was no baguette at all?
As there was no bakers yeast then!

Well to be honest, old thing, I can't do sourdough with the lads because we don't have the hours so I've been teaching them about sponges, poolish and bigas. Today we had three doughs on the go (not counting the pizza and soda bread) a rye/raisin, ciabatta and the baguettes, and a quick Swedish Rye in the oven. There was nothing to do for a while so I told the guys they could wander off for half an hour before things needed to be done. After thirty minutes I took the rye out of the oven, after forty minutes I scaled the baguettes, after 50 minutes I shaped the ciabatta, after an hour I shaped the baguettes, after an hour and ten minutes I formed loaves with the rye/raisin and dropped them in the tins. When the guys finally showed I told them to piss off home because there was nothing to do but bake off.

TP NOTHING is TRADITIONALLY baked with yeast.
Bakers yeast (the selcted strain we can buy in the supermarket today) has only been around for about 100 years and has really only taken off in commercial bakeries after WWII, so hardly a "tradition". It mainly took off because it is faster to bake with, and today the commercial bakeries have it down to a fine art (if you can call the result fine is some other matter) to bake "turbo breads".

Originally all leavened bread was leavened with some kind of "old dough" some of which may have been more "yeasty" than others, but sourdough all the same.
The ones with more yeast than acid also died out quicker, as they succumb to mold and other undesirable bacteria much easier.
Lactic acid is a quite good preservative on its own. In the old days it was used to rub off the moulds on cheese and salamis and to prevent re-occurence (at least for a while).